First….let me give credit to Connie for some of the pictures I’ve been posting on this trip. We created a shared album and I have pulled several great photos for which she deserves lots of credit.

When we arrived by train in Amanohashidate, our first surprise was our Hotel Monjusu room. The good news was it had a huge picture window with an amazing view of the canal, our very own blossom tree in full bloom, and the Sea of Japan in the background. The bad news was the 2 queen mattress were up on a short platform with ABSOLUTELY not an inch in between nor on either side…therefore, you had to crawl from the bottom of your mattress to the top. Then to get out of bed, you scooted to the end of the platform and attempted to stand up…our poor knees!!!😩 Bathroom trips in the middle of the night were dreaded! Thankfully we will only be here 2 nights.

Our first stop on Day 1 was an 800 year old Zen Temple in the center of town. There were cement platforms to hold up the gate piers because they’d be rotten wood long ago and the entire gate would have crashed down if they had built it with the posts going directly into the ground. The most unique thing here to me (as we are about Templed out) was the Fortune Tree…where visitors write a wish, prayer or message to the Gods on a slip of paper and hang it on the tree limbs.

The we crossed the “Heaven Standing Bridge” (which turns sideways to let ships thru) over to the famous Amanohashidate sandbank. This sandbank served as an ancient natural bridge and is included in many of Japan’s creation myths. It is actually a winding stretch of sand about 2 miles long connecting Miyazy Bay and the Azo Sea (Sea of Japan). So what would a trip to Amanohashidate be without trekking the full 2 miles to the other side thru the forest of approximately 8,000 Japanese black pine trees that cover the sandbank…many 1,000+ yrs old? I insisted on stopping every 400 or 500 steps to rest on the bench. I’m getting too old for these marathons😉 when you get to the opposite shore, you find the Moto Ise Shrine…where sake was first offered to the Gods.

Totally exhausted and starving, we hit a local restaurant to rest and once again eat our share of shrimp or chicken tempura… still searching for French fries! Then after a quick stroll thru yet ANOTHER Zen Temple where we saw the popular Camellia Bush (flowers look like roses) and the
Statue of the God of Sea….who rode the sacred turtle who put popped up outbid the sea and said climb on and guided the lost Emperor to Japan. This sounds like a myth to me but there was a pond nearby full of turtles…so who knows.

We took an open-air (no seat belts) chair lift thru the cherry blossoms to the top of the mountain to experience the “matanoxoki-style” (upside down looking thru your legs) tradition. Your view from that position is supposed to appear as a dragon descending to heaven. They call this view “Hiryukan”….or view of the skyward dragon. Of course….WE DID IT… and miraculously didn’t fall off the platform… but I was so scared that I would fall, no dragon appeared🫣

Next day, we navigated quite well, if I can brag, on a regional bus to Ine Village(pronounced E-Nay)a small fishing village about an hour away….population 800, 350 families and famous for its 230 waterside boathouses… known as “funayas”…some 160 years old…the newest being 60 years old. The rustic family house is split by a street now days (used to be a gravel path) now. We took a sea taxi tour of the Ine Bay which was the coldest adventure we’ve experienced so far🥶. If you ever want to visit Ine Village, I suggest in July during their large Festival when they pray to the Gods for good fishing.

A quick stop at the Sake brewery and a welcomed return to the hotel to partake of the community HOT bath to warm up.

Fun facts…

• Boy baby gift from grandparents is a samurai display for strength… and for girls a display of dolls (the emperor and his wife).
• Fisherman’s God emblem is on the corners of houses and buildings in Ine Village.

Our final day in this area turned into a total screw-up. Our guide on day 1 told us to get on a train to another village…get off at station 20 and someone would meet us to take us to an organic farm for a cooking lesson. We did! No one was there…I mean no guide…no people except the ticket guy who spoke absolutely no English. …otherwise deserted! Turns out we were supposed to get off 20 minutes earlier at Station 18, where our guide was waiting and saw 2 blondes sitting on the train but didn’t get off…watched us leave again😜. Dumb blondes she’s thinking but of course we were just following instructions. We were already upset about the fact we had expected a tour of a tamari facility and the organic farm had been substituted … so we opted to just go back to Amanohashidate and eat a leisurely lunch, get our luggage and head for Osaka by train. The sad part was as we were eating a grilled cheese, our original guide who’d told us to get off at Station 20, comes running into the restaurant acting crazy with apologies. He had actually left his family outing and driven to Station 20 (on a Sunday) to find us but the ticket guy said “ no those 2 crazy American women bought tickets back to Amanohashidate. So he came back and searched the entire village til he found us. Pretty amazing tracking skills!

On to Osaka… wish us luck on the train transfer in Fukuchiyama…you can read that any way you deem fit.🙃